Why I am Reconsidering Camilla, Future Queen Consort
As the world prepares for “Queen Camilla,” a look at the early life of the Duchess of Cornwall and her decades-long intertwinement with the Prince of Wales.
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Last week, when I first saw the letter from Queen Elizabeth II expressing her “sincere wish” that her daughter-in-law Camilla become Queen Consort, I had a visceral reaction. The idea of “Queen Camilla” sparked an emotional response in me, and not the kindest one, which felt at once unfair and unsettling.
For the last two decades, Camilla has enjoyed one of the most concerted and triumphant PR makeovers in modern history, morphing from a maligned mistress into a hard-working member of the royal family. By all accounts, it is authentic and deserved. She has kept her head down and her lips sealed, going about the relentless cadence of royal engagements with a sense of duty and joy. Reporters and photographers love her, often remarking on her tremendous sense of humor.
There have been signs in recent years that the royal family was backing away from “Princess Consort,” a title devised to minimize backlash to Charles and Camilla’s 2005 wedding. Perhaps most importantly, William and Harry seem to very much enjoy her company and have voiced their support of her.
And Camilla very obviously makes Charles extremely happy. From “The Duchess: Camilla Parker Bowles and the Love Affair That Rocked the Crown,” a 2018 biography by Penny Junor:
“To the Prince she is ‘my darling wife,’ and when he’s with her, you can see why. Everything about him, from the grin on his face to the relaxed body language, tells you that he adores her, depends upon her — she is a strong woman, far stronger than he — and that with her in his life he feels complete, I suspect for the first time. They are a compelling and well-matched couple, fired by the same ideals, tickled by the same sense of the absurd. They are friends, companions and soulmates, and in the fullness of time, with whatever title, she will be by his side to support him when he becomes King.”
Charles and Camilla sharing a laugh in 2015. (Photo via Getty Images)
So why did I not greet the news of “Queen Camilla” — a title, I might add, to which she is very much entitled when her husband becomes king — as reason for celebration? As progress? Or, at the very least, appropriate, given her dedication to Charles and the Crown?
I’m still in the process of unpacking my reaction; it feels more about a protectiveness of Diana rather than any sort of hostility towards Camilla. The most infamous love triangle of the last century, we now know, is actually the story of three flawed individuals, trapped by their circumstances and their choices. Yet the misogynistic focus was on the women, who were pitted against one another. As Diana and Charles battled it out publicly in the press, Camilla stayed silent — and was scorned. A more nuanced way of thinking about her feels long overdue.
I’ve received so many thoughtful Instagram DMs and emails that suggest lots of you are doing the same. Which I applaud! As a starting point, I thought it best to offer up a bit of a summary of Camilla's early life and her involvement with the Prince of Wales through their 2005 wedding. My sincere hope is that together we can reconsider Camilla and her role within the royal family.
As always, I would love to hear what you think. Please hit “Join the discussion” at the bottom of the email and share in the comments of this newsletter.
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Who is Camilla, the Duchess of Cornwall?
Camilla is the wife of Charles, the Prince of Wales and heir to the British throne. She is styled as Her Royal Highness the Duchess of Cornwall. As of earlier this month, thanks to the blessing from her mother-in-law, Queen Elizabeth II, Camilla is also the future Queen Consort.
Her first marriage, to Andrew Parker Bowles, ended in divorce in 1995. Together they have two children, Thomas Henry and Laura Rose, and five grandchildren. In 2005, Camilla married Charles, more than three decades after they first began a relationship.
Through her royal work, Camilla is president or patron of more than 90 charities. She focuses largely on women’s issues, including domestic violence, as well as osteoporosis and literacy, and has been praised for her passionate dedication. Privately, she enjoys riding horses and painting. The profiles I read all were quick to call out her sense of humor, her former chain-smoking habit, and her love of messy, cluttered spaces. She is said to prefer weekends in the country.
“If you wanted to be with someone who could go through the jungle and then scrub up in time for dinner, you couldn't find anyone better,” a childhood friend told the Guardian in 2005 before her wedding to Charles. “This is not a wicked witch: the average Englishwoman has far more in common with Camilla Parker Bowles than the ‘fairytale princess.’ ...But she doesn't covet titles and will never want to be Queen Camilla.”
(See how Camilla and Diana were still compared, all those years after Diana's death? More on that below).
What was Camilla’s early life like?
Camilla Rosemary Shand was born on July 17, 1947 at King’s College Hospital in London. (Odd but fun fact: She was delivered by the same obstetrician that oversaw the birth of Prince Charles 16 months later.) Camilla is the oldest of three children of Major Bruce Middleton Hope Shand and The Hon Rosalind Maud Shand.
The family was wealthy but not aristocratic. Camilla was educated at a pair of all-girls schools before attending Queen’s Gate School in South Kensington. Camilla was known as confident and charismatic, if not terribly studious. Later, she attended finishing school in Switzerland and studied French at the Institut Britannique in Paris. “Such lax academics were the norm for upper-class girls like Camilla,” wrote Sally Bedell Smith in her biography of Charles, “Prince Charles: The Passions and Paradoxes of an Improbable Life.”
Camilla was a debutante in 1965; she was not expected to have, nor did she pursue, a career but did work briefly as a receptionist at Colefax & Fowler, a high-end decorator.
How did Camilla meet her first husband?
In 1966, when Camilla was 19, she crossed paths with 27-year-old Andrew Parker Bowles. (An aside about how interconnected this world is: Andrew's father was close with the Queen Mother and Andrew served as a page at the Queen’s coronation in 1953).
After graduating from from Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, Andrew joined the Blues and Royals regiment of the Royal Horse Guards. “Athletic and handsome, he was extremely popular with the girls,” according to a 2005 Vanity Fair piece. Camilla and Andrew met via his brother, who worked at Camilla’s father’s wine business. She was “absolutely potty about him,” is how Patrick Beresford described it.
Camilla and Andrew dated for seven years before they got married. Their court ship was “rocky,” according to Vanity Fair, suggesting Andrew was not ready to settle down. They saw other people during this time; Camilla met Charles (more on that in a minute) and Andrew dated, among others, Charles’s sister, Princess Anne. But as a Roman Catholic Andrew was not considered an appropriate partner for a member of the royal family.
Prince Charles chats with Camilla Shand at a polo match in 1972. (Photo via Getty Images)
When did Charles enter the picture?
Although several reports suggest Charles and Camilla first met at a polo match in 1970, the prince’s official biographer, Jonathan Dimbleby, wrote that they were introduced by Charles’s former girlfriend. Lucia Santa Cruz and Camilla lived on different floors of the same building; Lucia invited Charles over, telling him she had “just the girl” for him.
“He lost his heart to her almost at once,” according to Dimbleby. Charles was struck by Camilla’s sense of humor, her love of the country, and her “down-to-earth irreverence.”
Lore has it that at some point, early on Camilla pointed out to Charles that her great-grandmother, Alice Keppel, had an affair with his great-great-grandfather, King Edward VII. “So how about it?” she said to Charles. The connection “intrigued her,” according to Junor. “But her principal motivation was to have some excitement and make Andrew jealous.”
Charles and Camilla were first photographed together in the summer of 1972, about six years into Camilla’s on-and-off-again relationship with Andrew. The prince was 23 and Camilla was nearly 25. “She had a ‘slightly sexy, ginny voice,’ and above all she knew how to make the Prince of Wales relax and laugh,” Sally Bedell Smith wrote in “Elizabeth the Queen.” Charles fell deeply in love with Camilla, although it’s unclear whether he shared those feelings with her before he departed on an extended tour of duty at sea in early 1973.
Camilla Shand married Andrew Parker Bowles on July 4, 1973 in what was called the “wedding of the year.” (Photo via Getty Images)
When did Camilla get married to Andrew?
Several weeks after Charles left, Andrew proposed to Camilla. Even though Camilla had been hurt by Andrew’s other relationships, she remained totally committed to him. They were married in July 1973, in what the papers called the “wedding of the year.” The Queen Mother and Princess Anne sat in the front row.
Charles was said to be devastated, but the two families remained close. Camilla and Andrew named Charles as a godparent to their son, Tom, born in 1974.
Why didn’t Charles propose to Camilla the first time they dated?
There are conflicting reports on whether Camilla’s feelings for Charles matched those he had for her — she very much loved Andrew at the time — or whether she had had any interest in joining the royal family. Other sources say that Charles, still in his early 20s, was not ready to settle down. One tabloid claimed that Charles did propose and Camilla turned him down.
But what seems agreed upon is that Camilla was not deemed a suitable match for the heir to the throne. “Camilla was not sufficiently aristocratic,” Junor wrote. What’s more, she was not a virgin. “The conventions of the time called for the heir to the British throne to marry a woman who at least appeared virginal,” wrote Sally Bedell Smith in her biography of the prince. “Camilla ‘had a history,’ Patricia [Mountbatten] noted, ‘and you didn’t want a past that hung about.’”
I need to point out the absolutely wild double standard here. During the 1970s, Charles was famously “popping in and out of bed with girls” — that’s according to a quote given to Time magazine by his great uncle and closest confidante, Dickie Mountbatten. His sex life was celebrated, while hers was reason for scorn.
When did Camilla and Charles become involved again?
Charles and Camilla rekindled their relationship after the birth of Camilla’s daughter, Laura, in 1978. Andrew was “openly unfaithful,” at this point, according to Bedell Smith. Camilla “was tired of sitting at home in the country while he played around with other women. It was high time he knew how it felt,” Junor wrote. Andrew wasn’t bothered; in fact, some “would say that a part of him quite enjoyed the fact that his wife was sleeping with the future King.”
Still, one of Andrew’s officers reported the affair to the Queen. Her Majesty said nothing. Charles had one or two other women in his life at the time; because Camilla was already married, the thought of her relationship with Charles becoming something serious was totally out of the question.
The death of Dickie Mountbatten, by an IRA bomb in the fall of 1979, pushed Charles and Camilla closer. The prince was overtaken with grief. “Desperate over the loss of his honorary grandfather, Charles reportedly went as far as to ask Camilla to leave Andrew and marry him,” according to the 2005 Vanity Fair piece. Camilla declined because doing so would mean Charles would have to “renounce the throne, but she promised to be there for him always.”
Pressure was mounting for the bachelor prince to find a suitable bride. Enter 19-year-old Lady Diana Spencer. The Queen Mother encouraged the courtship, which began in the summer of 1980. A year later, Camilla was in the audience for Charles and Diana's wedding.
Lady Diana Spencer and Camilla Parker Bowles at Ludlow Races in October 1980. (Photo via Getty Images / Express Newspapers Archive Photos)
When did Camilla meet Diana?
In her secret recordings for biographer Andrew Morton, Diana said she was introduced to Camilla “very early on.” Photos place them at the same horse race in October 1980, just months after Diana began dating Charles.
After the prince proposed, Diana moved to Clarence House and found a letter waiting for her. Dated two days prior, it was from Camilla, saying “Such exciting news about the engagement” and inviting her to lunch. The pair dined together, which Diana said was “very tricky indeed.”
Before the wedding, Diana said she found a bracelet with a “G” and an “F” intertwined, which she took to mean “Gladys” and “Fred,” the nicknames Camilla and Charles had for one another. (Others said it stood for “Girl Friday” and that Charles intended it as a farewell present for Camilla.) Later, on their honeymoon, Charles came to dinner wearing cufflinks that had two C’s intertwined. “He admitted that they were from Camilla but passed them off as a simple gesture of friendship,” Morton wrote. “Diana didn’t see it that way.”
Were Charles and Camilla together for the entirety of his marriage to Diana?
Charles, and several of his friends, have said that for the first five years “he was faithful to Diana,” according to Vanity Fair, meaning through the births of Prince William in 1982 and Prince Harry in 1984. Diana’s on-going mental health struggles, including her bulimia, the Vanity Fair piece said, “drove him to seek consolation with his former inamorata.” (Anyone else side-eyeing this blame?)
Diana was clearly tormented by the affection Charles felt for Camilla, regardless of whether the pair had a physical relationship. She told Morton she listened in on a phone conversation Charles had with Camilla while he was bathing. “Whatever happens, I will always love you,” she said she heard Charles tell Camilla. When she confronted him, the pair had “a filthy row.”
Diana and Charles on a tour of South Korea in 1992, after the publication of the Morton book but before the announcement of their separation. (Photo via Getty Images)
When did Charles and Camilla’s affair become public knowledge?
Although rumors of a growing rift between Diana and Charles began much earlier, suggestions that Charles had taken back up with Camilla weren’t rampant in the press until 1992. The relationship was exposed in Morton's bombshell biography, which we later learned was primarily informed by the secret recordings Diana had made for him.
“Were you able to, to your satisfaction, prove a sexual relationship outside of the marriage on the part of Charles?” talk show host Larry King asked Morton.
“No. No,” Morton said, according to transcripts.
“That’s just a suspicion?” King pressed.
“As far as I’m concerned, this is Diana’s perception of Camilla,” Morton answered. “It's her perception, her belief, and what she’s spoken to her friends about — on not just one occasion, on endless occasions. It drives her to distraction.”
How was Camilla treated in the aftermath of the Morton book?
The publication of the tell-all book upended Camilla’s private life. “She was stalked by the press, taunted with hate mail, and dismissed as ugly when compared with the beautiful Diana,” according to a piece in Vanity Fair this year. “So why did she stick around with Charles? The answer may be simple: Charles worshiped her and needed her.”
Camilla was known, for a prolonged stretch, as the “most hated woman in Britain.” Diana participated in the harassment, supposedly ringing Camilla in the middle of the night and then hanging up. She also called Camilla “the Rottweiler,” a name that was picked up by the tabloids, because “once she has got her teeth into someone she won’t let go.”
The back and forth was endless, and the coverage brutal, often focused on her appearance. One paper went so far as to say Camilla was “twice Diana’s age and half as beautiful.” Camilla stayed quiet then and now, which could not have been easy. “She’s portrayed as a terrible man-eater but that’s nonsense,” a friend of Camilla’s told the Guardian in 2005. “The things people write are dreadful and the comparisons with Diana must be hurtful. It's jolly difficult to stay glamorous all the time. She’s very attractive; she’s not a dog at all.”
What about Squidgygate and Camillagate?
Although Diana (naively) intended her confessions to Morton to somehow result in sympathy from Charles, the publication of that book only intensified the War of the Waleses. After the publication of the Morton book, the first of two recordings of 1989 phone calls found their way to the press. “Squidgygate” was a conversation between Diana and her longtime friend, James Gilbey. (The name stems from the nickname James had for Diana during the 23-minute conversation, repeatedly calling her “Squidgy” and “Squidge.”) The most famous line that emerged was from Diana: “Bloody hell, after all I’ve done for this f***king family.”
In December 1992, the year the Queen deemed “annus horribilis,” Charles and Diana separated ‚ but said they had no plans of divorcing.
The following year came “Camillagate,” a recording of a 1989 phone call between Charles and Camilla from a few weeks before the “Squidgygate” taping. This is, unfortunately, the infamous tampon exchange. Charles told Camilla he wanted to “live inside your trousers or something,” according to a transcript published in the Mirror.
CAMILLA: “What are you going to turn into, a pair of knickers? (Both laugh). Oh, you're going to come back as a pair of knickers.
CHARLES: Or, God forbid, a Tampax. Just my luck! (Laughs)
CAMILLA: You are a complete idiot! (Laughs) Oh, what a wonderful idea.
I find the end of the conversation to be the most revealing. Charles says, “Your great achievement is to love me,” to which Camilla responds, “Oh, darling. Easier than falling off a chair.” Then they did the thing where neither one of them wants to be the first to hang up the phone. Both in their early 40s at this point, they sound like a pair of lovestruck teenagers. From the Mirror transcript:
CHARLES: Don't want to say goodbye.
CAMILLA: Neither do I, but you must get some sleep. Bye.
CHARLES: Bye, darling.
CAMILLA: Love you.
CHARLES: Bye.
CAMILLA: Hopefully talk to you in the morning.
CHARLES: Please.
CAMILLA: Bye. I do love you.
CHARLES: Night.
CAMILLA: Night.
CHARLES: Night.
CAMILLA: Love you forever.
CHARLES: Night.
CAMILLA: G’bye. Bye my darling.
CHARLES: Night.
When did Charles acknowledge his relationship with Camilla?
It would be two more years before Charles would publicly confess his adultery, as part of a documentary by Dimbleby, his biographer. You can watch the relevant bits here. (The evening this aired is when Diana stepped out in her infamous Revenge Dress.) Asked specifically about Camilla, the prince tried to downplay their relationship.
“Mrs. Parker Bowles is a great friend of mine, I have a large number of friends that I’m terribly lucky to have, so many friends who I think are wonderful and make the whole difference to my life, which would become intolerable otherwise,” he said. “And she has been a friend for a very long time — along with a lot of other friends — and will continue to be a friend for a very long time.”
As for the issue of his infidelity, I am fascinated by the way Dimbleby formulated the question and the way Charles worded his answer — both of which helped Charles avoid a clear, damning soundbite.
“Were you, did you try to be faithful and honorable to your wife when you took on the vow of marriage?” the interviewer asked.
“Yes, absolutely,” Charles said.
“And you were?” Dimbleby pressed.
“Yes,” Charles said, then paused and added, “Until it became irretrievably broken down, us both having tried.”
According to Junor’s biography of Camilla, reports that she “begged the Prince not to speak to Dimbleby” were not true, but “she was annoyed with [Charles].” Her anger was directed at his private secretary, who in a press conference the following day “confirmed that the adultery to which the Prince had confessed was indeed with Mrs. Parker Bowles,” Junor wrote. “It was official. And it was a disaster.”
Andrew and Camilla with their son, Tom, in 1992 around the time the Morton book was published. (Photo via Getty Images)
What about Camilla’s first marriage? Where was Andrew Parker Bowles in all of this?
Before Charles’s public admission, Andrew and Camilla seemed to have agreed upon an open marriage. “They are well able to cope,” an anonymous source told the Evening Standard in 1992 about Andrew’s lack of outrage in the aftermath of the Morton book. “They have an extremely successful marriage. They lead quite separate lives in the sense that she’s in the country and he’s mostly in London. But I certainly don't think anything's wrong with their marriage. They’re very fond of each other. I think I’d say they have the measure of each other.”
After Charles confessed in 1994, Andrew’s feelings changed. “It was one thing for their friends and family to know about his wife’s love affair, quite another for the entire world to know,” Junor wrote. What’s more, Andrew wanted to marry his girlfriend, Rose Pittman, who was now divorced herself. Nevertheless, Andrew’s request for a divorce came as a shock to Camilla.
The pair jointly filed in December 1994. “We have grown apart to such an extent that, with the exception of our children and a lasting friendship, there is little of common interest between us, and we have therefore decided to seek divorce,” read a statement released by the couple.
When did Diana and Charles divorce?
A year later, the Waleses began divorce proceedings — an absolutely unthinkable turn of events. Diana’s Panorama interview with Martin Bashir, which aired in November 1995, was the breaking point. “There were three of us in this marriage,” she famously said. At the urging of Prince Philip, the Queen asked Charles and Diana to divorce. The divorce was finalized on August 28, 1996.
Almost exactly a year later, Diana was killed a year later in a car crash in Paris.
What happened to Charles and Camilla’s relationship in the wake of Diana’s death?
Charles had begun a PR campaign to overhaul Camilla’s image in the wake of his divorce from Diana. But the princess’s tragic death meant Camilla, as Junor wrote, “needed to vanish…he knew it would be a long time before they could be seen together.” Charles’s mother made her feelings clear. “The Queen had wanted her gone before Diana’s death and felt no differently after it. It was nothing personal.. her stance was one of monarch, not mother,” Junor wrote.
Frustrated with his mother’s hostility toward Camilla, and wanting to live openly with his longtime love, Charles confronted the Queen one night at Balmoral. It did not go well, according to a 2018 report in The Times:
“He assumed that the Queen, who rarely interfered or directly forbade anything, would not object. But on that evening she had had several martinis, and to Charles’s surprise she replied forcefully: she would not condone his adultery, nor forgive Camilla for not leaving Charles alone to allow his marriage to recover. She vented her anger that he had lied about his relationship with what she called ‘that wicked woman,’ and added, ‘I want nothing to do with her.’”
Still, the prince persisted. According to Junor, “He had already made it perfectly clear to anyone who would listen that Camilla was a non-negotiable part of his life.” Their relationship continued out of public view, although there were growing questions about whether Charles would have to give up the throne in order to be with her (aka following the footsteps of his great uncle, King Edward VIII, who had abdicated to marry twice-divorced Wallis Simpson).
For Charles’s 50th birthday in November 1998, the Queen hosted his official party on the eve of the big day — for 1,000 guests, no less — but did not invite Camilla. The following night, Camilla hosted a second soiree for Charles, which the Queen, Prince Philip, and all three of Charles’s siblings declined to attend.
Charles and Camilla in January 1999, photographed leaving a birthday party. (Photo via Getty Images)
When did Charles and Camilla emerge publicly?
In January 1999, nearly three decades since they began dating, 50-year-old Charles and 51-year-old Camilla were photographed together publicly for the first time. The pair were seen leaving the Ritz Hotel following Camilla’s sister’s 50th birthday party in January 1999. “Before that night, there had been a bounty of $3 million for a picture of the couple together,” according to CNN.
“AT LAST!” read the Mirror headline the following day.
What about William and Harry? How do they feel about Camilla?
William and Harry were not introduced to Camilla until 1998, more than nine months after Diana died. “For years both boys had absorbed their mother’s constant disparagement of their father’s lover,” Bedell Smith wrote in her book about Charles. “In her final years she had unwisely shared too much with William.”
And yet, Diana’s first born was the first to say he would meet Camilla, just before his 16th birthday. “The half-hour exchange of friendly small talk over tea and soft drinks went smoothly,” according to Bedell Smith. Afterwards, Camilla supposedly quipped: “I really need a gin and tonic.” She met Harry shortly thereafter.
The early years of the relationship sound uneven and tense at points, understandably so even as Camilla approached things gingerly. Still, there was a sense early on that the boys understood what she meant to Charles. Remember those 50th birthday parties for Charles in November 1998? William and Harry had held their own celebration for their father several months earlier — and invited Camilla. “The prince was enormously touched by the trouble they had gone to and the fact that hey had invited Camilla and put her in pride of place,” Junor wrote.
William and Camilla exchange a kiss at a polo match in 2005. (Photo via Getty Images)
When did the Queen come around?
Her Majesty was a slower sell. For years she avoided coming into contact with Camilla. Then, in the summer of 2000, Her Majesty agreed to attend a party knowing that Camilla would be there. “It was the first time the two women had come face-to-face in more than a decade,” according to Junor. After Camilla curtseyed, they exchanged small talk for a moment and took to their separate tables. The encounter was brief but significant, opening the door to a much better relationship. From Sally Bedell Smith’s biography of the Queen:
“Through years of vilification, Camilla maintained a discreet silence, which also impressed the Queen. ‘Camilla never whines,’ said one of her longtime friends. ‘She takes things as they come and tries to turn them into something humorous.’”
How and when did Charles propose?
Camilla gradually became a bigger part of Charles’s public and private life throughout the early 2000s. She was even given a prominent position, directly behind the Queen, at a ceremony marking Her Majesty’s Golden Jubilee in 2002. When Charles moved into Clarence House, following the Queen Mother’s death, Camilla was given her own suite there.
By the end of 2004, Charles had the blessing of his parents and his children to propose to Camilla. He got down on one knee on New Year’s Eve; they announced their engagement the following February. “I'm just coming down to earth,” Camilla remarked.
What was the reaction like to their engagement?
The headline the following day in the Express, a British tabloid, screamed: “What would Diana say?” However it seems American media had the strongest reaction. According to a 2005 Guardian piece, outlining the US/UK divide:
“‘An insult to Diana's memory’ and ‘The People's Homewrecker,’ thundered TV networks in America when the engagement was announced last week. But in Britain it did not cause a constitutional earthquake of Henry VIII or Duke of Windsor proportions that it might have done less than a decade ago. For some the Daily Star summed it up in their front page headline: Boring Old Gits To Wed, but most commentators welcomed the celebration of an enduring love in a civil ceremony even most in the Church of England now accept.”
Charles and Camilla on their wedding day in April 2005. (Photo via Getty Images)
How was Charles and Camilla’s wedding received?
Charles and Camilla were married on April 9, 2005, a day later than originally planned so as not to conflict with the funeral of Pope John Paul II. As had been the case throughout their decades-long relationship, the lead-up to the big day was filled scrutiny and sarcasm. I am not going to link to a Saturday Night Live skit from that year, featuring Seth Meyers as Charles and Fred Armisen as Camilla, because it’s so cringe. The jokes are, once again, mostly focused on Camilla’s appearance.
The mainstream media took part in jabs at the couple, too; it seems the harsh comparisons to Charles’s first wedding were irresistible. “This is such a teeny, weeny wedding, and Charles is heir to the throne,” said Hoda Kotb in a report for NBC News. “Just 30 people will jam themselves into this second-choice town-hall venue outside London. There likely won't be a horse or carriage in sight. And to crown it all, the groom's own mom and dad, who live in that big house across the street, aren’t even showing up to watch their son tie the knot.”
Indeed, as the head of the Church of England, Queen Elizabeth did not attend the civil ceremony, nor did Prince Philip. But Charles’s siblings and sons were there. William served as a witness, while Harry gave photographers a thumbs up. The whole family, however, joined together for the Service of Prayer and Dedication and the reception. The guest list for the latter topped 800 (including Andrew Parker Bowles) and featured an enthusiastic toast from the Queen to her son and “the woman he loves.”
The press coverage of the day itself seemed to acknowledge, despite all the criticisms of the couple, that the 56-year-old prince and his 57-year-old bride shared a special bond. “If there was a general mood in the ether during the long afternoon,” read the New York Times report, “it was one of sympathy for the realistic intimacy of middle-aged love, and a recognition of its differences from the heady but often unknowing love of youth.”
Perhaps the highest praise came from Harry that September, when he was asked about Camilla in an interview:
“To be honest, she’s always been very close to me and William. She’s not a wicked stepmother. Look at the position she’s coming into. Don’t feel sorry for me and William, feel sorry for her. She’s a wonderful woman and she’s made our father very, very happy which is the most important thing. William and I love her to bits.”
PS: I have to add! Camilla donned two different ensembles on her wedding day. For the civil ceremony, she opted for a white cream silk chiffon dress and coat with a wide-brimmed hat. But it was her second look that stole the show: a light blue chiffon gown with gold embroidery and matching statement feathered hat.
What is the deal with Camilla’s titles?
To quell potential backlash to the nuptials, the royal family said at the time that Camilla would be styled as “HRH The Duchess of Cornwall” rather than “Princess of Wales.” (As Charles’s wife, she is in fact the Princess of Wales but that title is still so closely associated with Diana.)
The royal family also announced Camilla would be known as “Princess Consort” whenever Charles becomes King. It was a surprise — the spouse of the King is traditionally the Queen Consort — and perhaps indicative of just how carefully they wanted to be with Camilla’s public presence.
(As an aside: There is not a King Consort, because King outranks Queen and therefore a King Consort would not be appropriate. The default is Prince Consort. Queen Victoria, for example, was married to Albert, Prince Consort.)
In the years since their wedding, the Queen has offered a few significant gestures of support for Camilla. In 2016, she made her a member of the Privy Council; at the end of last year, the Queen appointed Camilla a Royal Lady of the Order of Garter, the most senior knighthood. And of course, last weekend in the midst of her Platinum Jubilee celebration, the Queen expressed her “sincere wish” that Camilla would be known as Queen Consort:
“When, in the fullness of time, my son Charles becomes King, I know you will give him and his wife Camilla the same support that you have given me. And it is my sincere wish that, when that time comes, Camilla will be known as Queen Consort as she continues her own loyal service.”
Reading between the lines of the Queen’s announcement, it seems this decision was a public acknowledgement that the role of monarch requires the significant support of a strong partner. Elizabeth’s father certainly had it in her mother, and the Queen relied on it from Prince Philip.
“We are deeply conscious of the honour represented by my mother’s wish,” Charles said in response to the news. “As we have sought together to serve and support Her Majesty and the people of our communities, my darling wife has been my own steadfast support throughout.”
Camilla in Bath last week, making her first public appearance since the that she will become Queen Consort. (Photo via Polaris/i-images)
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But mostly: I’ve spent the last week absorbed in all things Camilla and I’ve found myself feeling a newfound…respect? Warmth, even? I’m not sure. She has been through a lot, and just kept going. There is no indication she ever wanted royal life; her devotion is to Charles. The ways in which Camilla shouldered the blame for their relationship feel profoundly unfair all these decades later. The aggression and hostility shown towards her, in hindsight and perpetuated at present, is a bit alarming, too.
I am struck, after all of this research, how Camilla has maintained her silence for as long as she has. We know what Charles thinks of Camilla, and what Diana thought of Camilla, but we haven’t a clue what Camilla has thought or thinks of any of this (aside from those leaked tapes, in which her love for Charles is clear). The restraint she has shown, as a prolonged and prominent public figure, in the midst of so much intense criticism is staggering.
As for Charles and Diana, that marriage was a mismatch from the start. Could it have been saved if the prince had stopped pursuing Camilla? Or if Camilla had refused his invitations? It’s impossible to say. I’m not sure I can fully fault Charles, either, given his flawed upbringing under the tremendous pressures of the Crown. Camilla was clearly a better match for him, a complement rather than a threat; but a future with her was always seen as not possible.
I have far greater sympathy for Diana, who was so painfully young and unsupported when she married Charles. Of course she was tortured by Camilla! Her tragic death compounds all of this. But questions about how she would have felt about Camilla becoming Queen Consort seem misplaced to me. Diana was divorced at the time of her death and was pursuing relationships of her own. Even if she was still alive today, she would never have been Queen Consort. We can’t possibly begin to guess how she would have reacted to this news.
Looking ahead, I think the transition to the reign of Charles will be tough. So much of the affection for the monarchy today rests on the shoulders of the Queen Elizabeth II. Perhaps having Queen Camilla by his side will make Charles a better king? That is the estimation of her biographer, Penny Junor: “In my view, when history comes to judge her, Camilla will not be seen as the woman who nearly brought down the House of Windsor. I think she will be recognised as the woman who shored it up.”
This is all a (very!) long way of saying that I am reconsidering Camilla. Perhaps you are, too? I’d love to hear what you think. Please hit “Join the discussion” below and share in the comments. You can also send me an email at Hello@SoManyThoughts.com.
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I’ll see you back in your inboxes on Tuesday, friends. Have a wonderful weekend.
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